I know what you're thinking, but don't worry. This article isn't 'Yet Another Red Hat 8.0 Review'. This article is primarily about using Red Hat 8.0 if you happen to be a newbie, but it's also about using Red Hat 8.0 if you happen to be a KDE user. Why? I happen to be a KDE user, so it makes sense I'd focus more on what I know the most about. Plus, I still remember the frustration of staring with something akin to terror at a blank command line with lots of ideas about what I'd like to do and very little knowledge of how to do it.

The .desktop files issue was not intentional (or at least the EFFECT was not intentional). Somehow it slipped by not only the Red Hat development team but the Null beta testers as well until not long before the release. As soon as it was brought to light, it was slated to be fixed but there wasn't time before the release. Red Hat is aware of the issue though (from what I've seen on the lists) and intends to remedy it.

Once that is done, I can't think of any legitimate reason for saying Red Hat has crippled KDE ... this is bad, yes, but they intend to fix it. It was a mistake. You'll note that in the article I stressed that Red Hat hasn't *intentionally* shipped broken software, but sometimes things slip through the cracks.

To get a feel for what Red Hat is working toward, visit http://www.freedesktop.org ... I think pretty much all the changes Red Hat made to GNOME and KDE (to integrate them) are listed there somewhere.